Tethered Worlds: Star in Bankruptcy

by Gregory Faccone

  Sand whirled around Jordahk as if he was the center of dust devil. He squinted in concentration and sweat trickled down his cheeks. They'd changed into spring armor for practice, and it had no trouble whisking away perspiration. The dirty cyclone became ordered around his son, like it had once before.

  This was the culmination point for activating the strange belt taken from the vault. They were trying to be cautious, but some devices were dangerous by nature. Kord was attuned enough to sense the area around Jordahk dimensionally warping. It reminded him of slipping into downhill drive.

  Downhill drive… Manifold Dipole Hyperplane Distortion.

  The thought made him curious, and more cautious. But when crisis struck, both he and Jordahk pushed the boundaries of mystic technology, and it had saved their lives. Some risks were worth taking, at least for their line.

  Dominating an advanced mystic device was challenging, especially one flawed in some way. It was at this point in their last test where the cyclone had broken down.

  “Come on Jordahk, stay with it a little longer.”

  The rotating cylinder was more than wind. Perhaps it wasn't wind at all. The ground was swept flat of the black wave patterns for a meter around Jordahk. A ridge of dark dirt built up around its edge. The phenomenon grew suddenly brighter, illuminated by a means he didn't understand. It concentrated into a sphere offering a partial reflection of the rawlands as if in an agitated pool.

  A cracking sound was followed by a teeth-rattling rumble. The sphere blew outward, pushing Kord back. The wave of force dissipated, and at its source Jordahk was split into three identical images, one appearing before him and one behind. Their distance from him varied, and the images flickered in and out of existence with eye-blinking rapidity.

  The pressure within that phenomenon must be tremendous, for Jordahk's knee buckled. In a flash the mirror images melded back into one. The rumbling came to an abrupt stop, and the earth heaved, throwing his son to the side.

  Jordahk tumbled to a stop, rolling like they had learned in Pankido dojos. Kord appraised him quickly, concluding he was all right. He smiled and tossed the canteen bag again, trying not to make a big deal of the unusual display.

  “What am I, your water boy?” He smiled. “That was an adventure. What did it feel like?”

  Jordahk breathed deep, wiping sweat from his brow. “Like I was being stretched into… multiple places?”

  “Seems about right from what I saw. Here, look for yourself.” Kord brought up a VAD recorded from above showing the last moment of the activation attempt. “You're having more luck with your treasure than I am with mine.”

  “Wasn't this taken by the dragonfly?”

  “It was, under duress. And the quality's not great. The thing's non-visual bands are sub-acceptable too.”

  When he activated the dragonfly for its first flight, it raced out of his hand, zigzagging in ever widening circles around their position. It was a crazed, single-minded, hard-to-control contraption. Eventually it slowed and acted upon commands, albeit reluctantly. Kord knew that anthropomorphizing inanimate objects with human qualities was questionable. It nevertheless felt appropriate for this gadget.

  Jordahk examined the visuals. “At least yours is completing some sort of action. I feel like I'm on the verge, but I'm wary of the final push.” Jordahk ran his finger along the greather belt around his waist. The crisscrossing metal lines were neumenium, the newest and strangest of the platinum group metals. When Sojourners used it, it often implied a certain kind of function. “Dimensional stuff… This thing feels all to ready to cut open space.”

  “So the danger for yours is in the execution.” Kord closed his eyes and concentrated for a moment, then glanced up shaking his head. “It fights even the most simple commands.” After a brief metallic buzzing, the dragonfly alighted on Kord's finger.

  “You said these things were in the vault for a reason.”

  “Everything's in that vault for a reason.” Kord addressed the dragonfly like Aristahl. “What is yours?”

  ▪ ▫ ▪

  Kord noted the distance readout as he and Jordahk sat in the manufactured shade of the fanicle's opaqued top. Goldy was a fast-moving speck in the distance.

  “Kord,” came Goldy's mechanical voice transmitted into their ears, “I'm already past pistol engagement range.”

  “Okay, just go a little farther,” Kord said. “Find a decent rise, set up the targets and get back here. I want you participating, too.”

  “We're going to compete with a combat bot?” Jordahk asked.

  “We do seem to encounter them. They're strong in a narrow band of operations, but they're not infallible. Plus scientum machines don't know what to make of mystic. It gives us an edge.”

  “Sir, I've proved myself during your mystic forays,” Highearn said. Kord's scientum AI had a bland, minimalist personality. Its focus was military information and tactics. The indignant hint in its tone was about as much simulated emotion the AI ever expressed.

  Highearn was right, though. He helped when Kord almost burned himself out pushing a mystic stun floater beyond all reason. His thigh was still plagued by the occasional tremor, an unfortunate side effect of his reckless, unschooled abandon. But it occurred with less frequency, perhaps as he willingly became more familiar with what Sojourners called the sub-quantum circus.

  “Yes, Highearn. But I think you're an exception.” Kord sported his boyish grin and winked at Jordahk. “You've had years of exposure to Wilkrests.”

  “Goldy's coming back,” Jordahk said. “I can't even see the target bases.”

  “Targets on,” Kord said.

  Two humanoid silhouettes popped into existence at a distance most pistol shooters would consider folly. Their red color distinguished them from the bland landscape.

  “If you switch them to local camouflage,” Jordahk said, “I'm boycotting.”

  Goldy covered the distance back at inhuman speeds and joined them behind an upthrust wall of rock.

  Kord drew and looked over his grister. The stocky pistol felt comfortable, but had seen hard use and looked it. He was a little surprised it survived the last two action-packed years. He smiled.

  Action-packed.

  Is that what he considered attempts on his life by soldier, combat bot, and crazed mystic user?

  Goldy pointed his arm downrange over the wall. “Your weapon sacrifices accuracy for hitting power.” His integral grister unfolded above his forearm. “It's unlikely that even one of your skill will land effective first shots under these conditions.”

  “And no zoomies, Dard,” Jordahk said.

  He and his son both wore rets on their eyes. Most did. They were good for displaying simple information, text, and weapon reticles. But many, including Jordahk, found zoom feature rets uncomfortable. He didn't.

  “Okay, just rets.”

  Kord concentrated, feeling the air, the temperature, and the grit aloft. His scientum grister could not shape ammo nuts with the same flexibility as Jordahk's autobuss. But he didn't need dramatic changes. A few alterations to the silhouette should do it. He thought about the modification controls, a common, readable thought pattern, and Highearn brought up a VAD. Kord lengthened the ammo nut and tried to concave the rear.

  Grister projectiles were simple, tiny slugs super accelerated to air-burning speeds beyond practical course correction. Smart-barrel adjustments, made by your AI at trigger pull, wouldn't be enough at these ranges like they might in an action scenario where one was shooting on the run. This was about finesse beyond initial trajectory—and some guesswork.

  He'd shot out here many times and knew well how the terrain affected ammo nuts. He let out a breath and fired a max power shot, letting the pistol recoil naturally, like he taught their training gig attendees when a single accurate hit was required. After an interminable instant one of the red silhouettes flashed white and turned green. The target transmitted a satisfying impact sound to them.

  Jordahk looked to be supp
ressing a smile, and attempted an expression of mock incredulity. “Typical.”

  Goldy spread his legs into a stable stance, made fine adjustments to his arm alignment, and after what Kord thought was an extra second of calculation, fired. Nothing happened downrange. The target remained red and not even a puff of dust marked the miss.

  The unflappable command model looked about as nonplussed as Kord had ever seen.

  “My integral grister programming is not suited for engagements such as this.”

  Jordahk did not suppress a smile this time. “Sure Goldy.”

  “I fail to see the humor.”

  “You would,” Max chimed in.

  “Looks like Goldy's setting up camp tonight,” Jordahk said.

  “Firstly, you have not hit the target yet either.” The robot's deep timber resonated. “Secondly, I am usually tasked with setting up camp anyway.”

  Jordahk looked across the infertile plain. “Dard, this is smelting rifle range.”

  “Long arms are staying in the fanicle. This isn't just marksmanship. It's about concentration and body control.”

  His son drew from the sling bag he favored. Rainbow colors reflected within the newly pearlescent construction of the autobuss. War era mystic autobusses were peculiar, two-century old anachronisms, and the handcrafted pistol of choice for Sojourners.

  This was the second one his son owned, and it didn't originally look like that. Jordahk told of how he'd fired a legacy shell with it. A shell created by a very special Sojourner. Supposedly the entire weapon had transformed into some sort of energetic cage. When it came back together its metallic appearance was gone, replaced by this almost organic, opalescent seashell composition. Not that there were sea shells on Adams Rush, but he'd seen replicas.

  “No, Max,” Jordahk said. “Give me the stubbier shape, and I want a divot on the nose... No, it's okay. We don't need speed here.”

  “Haven't I told you not argue with your AI?” Kord chided. But there was humor in their well-worn exchange.

  Jordahk shook his head and extended his pistol. He let an autostock unfold and brace against his shoulder. In a moment the weapon bucked with the iconic thunk of an autobuss.

  They all looked downrange with expectancy, but nothing happened.

  “It went high,” Goldy said.

  Jordahk had more potential than he knew. Aristahl saw it as if it already existed, and his wife dreamed it as fact.

  “Take one more,” Kord said. He put a hand on Jordahk's shoulder. “Take a deep breath and feel the trajectory. Reach out like you did when we practiced with that shield controller. See if you can sense the target.”

  “That shield controller was mystic. This target is scientum. You can't reach out to that stuff.”

  “It's the only energetic thing out there. Try.”

  Kord was no mystic master. He left such advanced training to Aristahl. But he could keep pushing Jordahk on the basics. His son took it well and lined up for another shot. He aimed for a long few seconds and the autobuss began to reconfigure before their eyes. The barrel extended and narrowed. Supporting ribs formed down its length. A second autostock extended from the rear of the pistol to his other shoulder forming a stable triangular platform.

  The pearlescent surface moiré patterned as if two layers were moving opposite each other. A faint whirring sound implied physical gyros were stabilizing the pistol. And in his own consciousness, in that place where mystic formed, he could sense activity. A great energy built.

  The autobuss recoiled with a louder report. A trail of blurred air pointed to the target which suddenly leaped into the air. The red silhouette toppled end over end until it's projecting base returned to the ground.

  Jordahk blinked and took a deep breath as the autobuss returned to default shape.

  “Impressive,” Max said.

  “Yes,” Goldy said, “if you were aiming for the target base. The silhouette was not intercepted.”

  “Don't be a poor sport, Goldy,” Kord said. “He got closer than you.”

  Jordahk looked downrange again and paused. He opened his mouth to say something but hesitated.

  Kord looked downrange with zoomies. “What is it?”

  “It's what you said before. About the targets being the only energetic things out there.” He craned his neck, suddenly looking into the air around them. His eyes grew wide. “Something's here. A lot of something!”

  The security contraption on the fanicle beeped three times. Its most urgent alarm.

  Goldy's head turned in a flash to an area beyond their target.

  “Sniper!” Highearn said.

  The robot leaped at them, shoving them hard down the wall. A flash preceded a line of flame penetrating the ground. It burst from the rock wall where they'd stood , and into Goldy's torso. The combat bot's armor, which could shrug off grister fire all day, was no match for a sniper gun. They tumbled amid Goldy's parts as his head bounced past them.

  Chapter Three

  One of the few satisfactions left in life was the successful execution of a mission. He felt a brief echo of excitement, a shadow from his pre-augmentation days, when he came upon the secondary targets so exposed. It was random good fortune that he was able to observe them from the shuttle during his approach over the non-terraformed territories. He wasn't equipped for a straight head-to-head heavy combat engagement, but the situation didn't require that.

  The choice to slither along the ground had been the right one. The approach took hours, but he accomplished it as only his brethren could, with minimal fatigue. His intuition to use only visual camouflage paid off. Everything was turned off, and his backup for this mission was a kilometer behind, running only a trickle of current through its transceiver.

  Confirmation that his low-tech choice was the right one came when they somehow detected him once the sniper gun powered up. Few could haul such a weapon so far without aid. Certainly a combat bot could, but they were blunt instruments, lacking the tactical finesse called for here.

  No thoughts of failure were entertained, but should he not succeed, he knew another was on his way to try in a different venue. Nothing stopped his brethren. They struck fear for good reason.

  The situation unfolded rapidly, although to his kind's enhanced perception it was an ordered, understandable pace. Holding back the espies was no longer necessary. He ordered them forward at maximum speed. Battlefield overwatch would be his advantage. This environment offered no place to hide from his cam-eyes in the sky.

  He needed their aid since his quarry was mostly obscured behind a ridge. In seconds the tiny robots were far enough ahead to triangulate his first shot. He'd been surprised to find them with a combat bot, an old Perigeum model at that. It was acting the role of guardian anselbot. Dealing with it should not take great effort once the humans were removed from the equation.

  Though his enemy was alerted, his ground penetrating shot would surprise them. He aimed the gun manually on its simple telescoping arms, since lugging its auto-mount was impractical, even for him, and fired.

  The sniper gun pushed straight back hard enough to break the bones of a regular man. What choice did he have but to stop it? Without the anchoring auto-mount the gun would fly back. These first few seconds were too critical.

  The targets moved at the last instant, but a spray of metal appeared over the ridge. So the bot was eliminated first. He ordered his army of espies into a hemisphere above them.

  Isolate all communications, he ordered with a thought.

  To the rear, his impatient backup activated of its own accord. That was the trouble with those beasts, they were practically mindless. But it was time to order its approach anyway.

  Forward at maximum speed. Destroy targets of opportunity.

  ▪ ▫ ▪

  “Goldy!” Jordahk yelled.

  The robot's head came to a stop looking at them. The new, animated lights for his mouth flickered in malfunction.

  “Power failing… Keep moving… Enemy overwatch�
��” Goldy crackled to silence.

  His father pulled them farther down the wall. “Come on.”

  Their once soft spring armor had hardened at the security contraption's alert, and they assented to having the helmets close. A short brim extended from their spring armor caps, and hard air formed between it and their oversized collars.

  “Threat located,” Highearn said. “Human with a sniper gun.”

  A VAD projector on Kord's armor displayed an image taken from the security contraption on the fanicle. A partially obscured man with a huge rifle lay on the ground well past their pistol targets.

  “Keep moving,” Max said. “He's lined up to fire again.”

  The rock wall beside them flashed, sprouting another line of flame. Stones pelted their armor but the line narrowly missed, sinking into the earth beyond. In the VAD, the man bucked wildly.

  “He's not using an auto mount,” Kord said. “It'll give us a couple more seconds between shots.”

  “I think the air's filled with his espies,” Jordahk said. “That must be what I sensed before.”

  “That's how he's triangulating shots so accurately with us out of sight. Wait, you said 'before'?”

  “Yeah, I'm not getting it now.” Jordahk reached up, pointing his autobuss downrange over the ridge. “Huh?” He aimed straight up and started to say something but stopped short. “—This thing's focusing me somehow, or amplifying, or something. But I can sense things more clearly in the direction I'm pointing.”

  Kord shook his head. “What a time to learn this stuff.”

  “He's ready to fire again,” Max said. His gravelly voice was reassuring in the tension. “Stay random.”

  They spread apart and another shot splintered rock between them. Before the shrapnel subsided his father's arms were over the wall and he was sending three-shot-bursts downrange. Despite the beyond impractical range, explosions of dirt showed up around their assailant in the VAD.

  “If he's armored, they won't penetrate at this range,” Kord said, “but at least I'm giving him something else to think about.”